Locked (25 page)

The French classroom is in the left side of the school.

I type as fast as I can, making so many typos it takes forever to come out right.
Where are you? Are you okay?

Mr. Dalton is closing the shades one by one, dialing 911 with his free hand.

IA:
Sherlock?

“Everyone stay very quiet,” Mr. Dalton is saying, guiding my terrified, whispering, panicking classmates toward the wall. “We don’t want to draw attention.”

IA:
Sherlock, I’m coming to find you.

This is stupid. This is very, very stupid. It doesn’t matter. I promised Mycroft.

“Irene Adler! Stop!” Mr. Dalton suddenly shout-whispers, but it’s too late, I’m halfway across the room. I unlock the door and I’m out into the hall before anyone can stop me.

We still have to go on our date.

The hallway is silent and empty. Like a crypt. All the doors closed. Only the faint sound of someone crying hangs in the air. It gets inside me, turns my blood to water. I should hide. I should get back inside the classroom. I should—

I can’t.

My phone screen flashes.

SH:
IRENE

IA:
Sherlock? Where are you?

IA:
STAY WHERE YOU ARE

He never uses caps.

IA:
Are you okay? I left class, I’m looking for you.

SH:
TELL ME WHERE YOU ARE

But I don’t type anything back, because there are footsteps behind me.

I don’t turn around. I run. The right side of the school. I have to lead him toward the right side of the school. Away from Sherlock.

The footsteps behind me quicken. I glance behind me and I don’t see a face, don’t see a body. Just a hand. Holding a gun.

I run.

I can’t die. I’m going on a date with him.

Neither of us can die. That’s not allowed.

I’m faster than whoever it is. They’re not running. Just walking quickly. I’ve left them behind. I turn a corner—the janitor’s closet is left half-open—I duck into it, closing the door behind me. Be silent. Be still. My breathing is so ragged. I look through the slats in the door. The shooter rounds the corner. He walks straight past.

I still can’t see his face.

Just the gun.

My heart is going to fall apart. It’s beating too fast. It’ll stop if it keeps beating that fast. School shooting, one fatality: girl dies of a heart attack in the janitor’s closet. It’s dark in here, a mop handle resting on my shoulder, a bucket digging into my ankle. My hands are ice-cold and trembling so hard I can barely pull out my phone.

SH:
IRENE, I’M COMING TO FIND YOU.

IA:
No Sherlock, stay hiddne.

SH:
You’re typing badly. Are you hurt?

IA:
Just scared

SH:
Don’t be scared. I’m coming to find you.

Don’t, he’s in the halls
I type and then clutch the phone to my chest, trying to breathe. He is fine. He hasn’t been shot. Everything is still fine as long as he hasn’t been shot.

How long has it been? Two minutes? Three? Are the police already outside?

Yesterday, I would have had third period with him.

But I can’t stay where I am, hidden, safe. I have to find him. Everything will be okay as long as I’m with him. That’s been true ever since he moved to Aspen. I just have to find him. I open the door a crack. Breathe. Breathe. I can’t see the shooter. I push the door open wider and escape.

I’m going to find him, and we’re going to hide together until the police come, and then we’ll visit Carol’s grave, and then we’ll go on a date.

I retrace my steps, heading back toward the science wing. Every classroom door is still shut and locked, the shades pulled down. The silence is deadly. Poisonous. There hasn’t been a gunshot since the second one. Maybe the shooter is out of bullets. Maybe this is all a nightmare.

Footsteps again, and then someone is rounding the corner in front of me and I don’t have time to hide—

But it’s him.

“
Irene
.” He strides forward and I have just enough time to see how pale he is before he grabs me, squeezing me so tightly it chokes all the fear out of me. But just for a second. Because he lets go and seizes my hand instead. “We need to hide.”

“I t-told you n-not to come out.” My teeth are chattering. Like they were after we jumped into the ocean.

“Don’t talk. He’ll hear us.”

He pulls me to the nearest classroom, holding his arm around me like a shield, and knocks twice, quietly but sharply. “It’s not the shooter. It’s Sherlock Holmes and Irene Adler. The shooter is currently on the other side of the school. If you’ll lift up the shade you’ll see we don’t have weapons. Let us in.”

The corner of the shade lifts and the terrified face of Ms. Fields, the sub we had the day he tried to break up with me, appears. The doorknob twists. “Get in, quickly,” she manages, eyes rolling wildly toward each end of the hallway.

We dart inside. It’s a sophomore class. The students are clumped against the back wall, some crying, some covering their faces. Four girls are sitting in a circle, holding hands with their eyes closed.

“H-hey.” A round-faced boy points at Sherlock. “Isn’t that—the guy who’s supposed to have killed—you let him in—!”

“You idiot,” his friend, a girl, hisses. “The shooter’s probably the one who killed that senior! Shut up!”

Sherlock guides me to the far corner of the classroom and sits down, pulling me after him. He puts his hands on either side of my face, gently. The sense of warmth kills my shiver.

“Are we going to die?” someone moans.

“Listen to me, all of you,” Sherlock says, raising his voice enough for everyone in the classroom to hear but not enough for the sound to leak into the hallway. He doesn’t move his hands. “The door is locked. No one’s getting in. It’s a matter of minutes until the police assess whether or not it’s a hostage situation and neutralize the shooter.”

Some of the weakness trickles out of my knees.

“What if he does have hostages—” Ms. Fields stammers.

“He doesn’t. If he wanted hostages, he’d have picked a classroom and stayed in one place. He’s on the move.” He glances toward the door. “He’s looking for someone.”

“Sherlock.” I force down the lump in my throat and wrap my fingers around his wrist. “I saw him. He was right behind me.”

“Did you see who it was?” He’s very close to me. Our knees are touching. He’s still cradling my face. I don’t think he realizes how tenderly he’s doing it.

“I didn’t. It’s a guy, though. I think. What if the person he’s looking for—”

And then he presses his forehead to mine, creating a small warm space just between the two of us. “I am going to be fine. You are going to be fine. Do you know why?”

“No,” I whisper.

He half-smiles. I can see every line that it makes on his skin. “Because it’s your birthday.”

“That’s not very rational.”

“Being rational is boring, sometimes.”

My phone buzzes and I sit back, severing our connection—I don’t usually get texts from anyone but him, what if it’s important? What if it’s Mom? But it’s Ethan Thomas.

ET:
are you okay??? I’m texting all my friends. where are you??

IA:
I’m fine, I’m in the biology room.

ET:
are you with Sherlock?

I start to type back
yes,
but I stop.

Why does Ethan care where Sherlock is?

The coldness seeps back into my blood.

“Sherlock…”

Three loud pounding noises split the silence
.
Someone’s knocking on the door, not quietly like Sherlock had done, but desperately. “Please, someone let me in! Someone, quick!”

At first I don’t recognize the voice, it’s so loud and panicked. But then I do.

And all the breath sinks out of me as I understand everything.

“
Wait
!”

But Ms. Fields has already opened the door.

Ethan Thomas walks in, holding his gun in front of him as casually as if he were offering it to us.

“Did I tell you Ethan asked me out?”

“He did what?”

We’re in the cafeteria. I look up. Sherlock is roundly ignoring his pizza. I didn’t expect the level of interest in his voice. No, not just interest. Something else is there, too. “The other day, right before you stopped August being a dick to me. I guess Ethan’s not judging me over the photo thing.”

“Did you say yes?” There’s still something in his voice. Something I can’t quite name.

“No,” I say. “Ethan’s an okay guy. But I’m not interested.”

“I wasn’t certain, since you agreed to that request for Ares…”

“Nope. Definitely not interested.”

“Good,” he says absently, toying with his phone.

“Why good?”

But he doesn’t reply.

Ethan Thomas is smiling.

The same way he smiled at me in the graveyard.

“I thought subs were supposed to read the entire safety pamphlet. You’re really not supposed to unlock your door during a school shooting, Ms. Fields.”

The wave of terror in the classroom is like something I could reach out and touch. It’s like another creature in the room with us. The sensation of so many people realizing how fragile they are, how easily their hearts could stop pumping, how little it would take for the blood to spill out.

A horror is growing inside me.

I told him where we were.

Sherlock is staring at Ethan. “Ah,” he says.

“Is that all you have to say?” Ethan cocks the gun in his direction. He doesn’t flinch. I flinch so hard it hurts and Sherlock presses his hand against the small of my back. Ethan notices. His jaw twitches. “I’m surprised you didn’t figure it out sooner. All your investigating.”

“I did figure it out.” His eyes are steady. So steady. “I was right after all, wasn’t I, Irene? Told you I’m never wrong.”

The horror inside me is crystalizing, splintering, breaking through every part of me. I have to find a way to freeze this. Freeze time.

You’re a good sister
, he’d said.

And I’d said to him—

It’d be easier if he was gone. If everyone was gone.

“I see.” Ethan leans against the whiteboard, tapping the gun lightly on his knee. “When did you figure it out? This morning? Must have been pretty recently.”

“Yesterday,” Sherlock says. “Although I wasn’t sure. You convinced me I was wrong. No one’s ever done that before. You’re quite a good actor.”

“Thank you.”

I’m a millisecond away from cracking open and screaming. What is Sherlock doing, chatting with him like that?

Then I get it.

He’s buying time.

“Sherlock,” I say.

“Hm?” He’s sprawled on the floor, reading something that, for the millionth time, isn’t homework.

“Do your homework.”

“Dull.”

“You need to get good grades.”

“Why?”

I’m very tempted to dump my glass of juice on his head. “Because you need to get into a good college so you can have a good career.”

“Again. Dull.” He turns a page.

“You need to get a good career so you can make money for your retirement and move to the countryside or something. Take up beekeeping. Whatever.”

“Retirement?” His mouth twists up into a lazy smile. “Irene, do you really think I’ll last that long?”

“What?”

“I prefer not to languish to my end with my mind gradually diminished by age. I choose to live efficiently. Die young while I’m still me.”

I toss my homework folder aside, shaken. “You’ll still be you when you’re old, Sherlock.”

He catches my homework folder. “I’m not me without my mind.”

“You’re more than your mind,” I say angrily. “You can’t just decide to die once you stop being as smart. You have to think about the people who love you.”

“And who’s that?” He rolls on his back, propping his head up with his elbow, eyes following me with mild curiosity.

“Do your homework,” is all I say.

“Let me make sure I have it all straight,” Sherlock says. “You were in love with Irene’s sister, Carol. Obsessed, in fact. When we were cleaning out her room, I discovered several crumpled love letters. Crumpled, meaning she didn’t return your affections. They weren’t signed, but I’m certain they were from you.”

Ethan’s face hardens. “You cleaned out her room?”

Sherlock smiles. “Yes. Re-painted it. In fact, I moved in.”

I move slightly closer to him, my hand hovering over his wrist. On the surface, Ethan hasn’t changed. But something underneath his skin has shifted. There’s a rage emanating from him that reminds me of when I’d approached Sherlock’s burning house and felt an almost physical resistance from the heat.

“When Carol died, you were heartbroken,” Sherlock continues conversationally, but his fingers slip into mine and then we’re tightly holding hands. “You couldn’t just brush away your feelings for her. They were too powerful. Nor could you accept her death. So you transferred your emotions to Irene, turning her into a Carol-substitute.”

There’s a very slight tremor in Ethan’s hand now. The hand holding the gun. “You don’t know how similar they are. They act different, but deep down they’re the same.”

“No,” says Sherlock. “Irene is unique.”

“Careful.” And Ethan levels the gun at Sherlock’s head.

Someone in the range of students lets out a choked sob. I’m thinking so fast I’m almost nauseous. Sherlock always solves everything by thinking. I have to stop this—but how? Could I tackle Ethan? Would there be enough time?

“I’m always careful,” Sherlock says.

“I have a question for you, Sherlock.”

We’re walking to school. It’s a cold day, and I’ve wrapped a scarf around my face. I tug it down to talk. It’s something I’ve been thinking about for weeks now.

“I have an answer for you, Irene.”

“Why me?”

He doesn’t stop walking. “Why you what?”

“I mean—” I do my best to keep my voice casual, like I’m not asking anything important at all, when in reality it’s one of the most important things I’ve ever said out loud. “Why did you pick me? To be your friend, I mean.”